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goddessinsecta

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Everything posted by goddessinsecta

  1. Dearest Kay-- My heart hurts for you so much right now. You have been having a rough enough time as it is without this. How dare he do this to you! His actions are the shabbiest and most dishonorable of treatment. He is utterly unfit to be your husband. Doesn't he remember the part "forsake all others" in the marriage vows? It is time for you to make a decision that is the best choice for you. I, and all the others here, can fuss and squall about this all we want, but ultimately, you have to be the one that lives with your decision. But I will say that this is not the action of a loving husband. And you deserve so much better in a man than this. Think about it. Divorce or toxic relationship? You choose. I say these things not in judgment of you at all, and I hope you will not be angry with me for what I think of your husband. We love you here, and our messages to you are out of love and friendship and we have your best interest at heart. Please continue keep us posted, because either way you are in for a rough patch of road and will need all the support you can get. All the best to you dear, and hang in there! Margaret
  2. Hi Lnette--- Honey, I am so sorry your baby's passing was traumatic for both of you. Please know that each of us, human and beloved pet, has our own separate journey, our own death--but a shared heaven. Everything will be revealed and understood. You will have answers and you will have great joy, and never be separated again. It hurts so bad--I know--we all know here. You had no control over those last couple of minutes, you know. Life is unpredictable, and sometimes these things just happen. She bit you because she was scared and didn't feel good, and you were closest!--- not because she didn't worship and adore you! We are our pet's mommies and daddies, and it kills us for our babies to suffer, even a little. You are doing beautifully already by acknowledging what a wonderful last night you had together. Go even further when you are able, and remember all the good times. It'll make you cry, too, but you will feel at least a little better. Realize that those couple hard moments in a ten-year life--minutes during which you could not control the events---are, ultimately, very negligible in perspective. By your words, you were, and always will be, besotted with love over that little cat of yours. You were chosen for her, and she for you, to live together and love each other. And you did a fine job. And you can look forward to more good times with her in the next world---and when the time is right, perhaps open your heart to another in this world that is longing for love. I am thinking of you. Margaret
  3. Dear Rena-- I am so very, very sorry for you and the pain you are in. It will take time and getting rid of that toxic guilt before you will feel better. I am a nurse, and we were taught in nursing school that it takes two full years to mourn an immediate family member--sometimes more, sometimes a little less, but not often! Be patient and kind to yourself. Those babies loved you and you loved them. End of story. You have done nothing wrong, my dear. Everything you did for them was out of love. And I want to tell you something else. You said your cat died in pain and convulsing. Our seventeen year-old cat, Fanchon H'sa had a huge, three-minute seizure the night she died--we were going at 9AM the next day to our beloved Dr. Sherry and Dr. Angela to euthanize her, but didn't quite make it, so it was Kitty ER for us. My husband was in total anguish during her seizure, but I was not. Why? Seizures don't hurt and they don't cause pain. How do I know? I had one myself in 2001. So I know. Please know that animals and humans can make LOTS of noise while all this thrashing is going on--sometimes it sounds like they are possessed! This can make a witness think they are in agony--they are most assuredly not! The seizure is followed by a stage called the "post-ictal stage", in which the person/animal goes into a deep sleep for awhile--up to 2 hours. This is when we brought Fanchon in--she was groggy, but not hurting, and very peaceful. The reason we brought her in right away if she wasn't hurting during a seizure and was sleepy afterward--and didn't wait for morning? Sometimes another seizure can follow that becomes a series of continuous seizures, called "status epilepticus", and I sure as hell didn't want to try getting her into a cage while she was seizing and acting like a rabid demon! I wish I could take away all your pain--that takes time and personal effort from you--but I hope you will feel better about the info I shared with you in this message. I am in mourning, too. We all are here. And this is a good place to come to, because if anyone understands, it's this group. May blessings, healing, and new joys await you soon-- Margaret
  4. Hi, Jackie-- I am so sorry and so touched reading about your loss. I learned in nursing school that it takes a minimum of two years to properly grieve over a loved one, and I have found it to be true. This might seem like bad news ("What?!? Two years of this? Oh, my God!!!"), but it is actually good news. When you cry or have a bad day, tell yourself, "I still have _ months/years to go. I am normal, and it is proper to take time to heal." Some folks take more time yet, and some less, all of which is normal. Injuries to the psyche are the hardest and therefore take the longest time to heal. My daddy died in 2000, and we still haven't given his clothes away! When my mama suggested we do that a year after he died, I remember, I teared up and said "We don't have to be in such a hurry to get rid of him.". I realize this is silly, but I wasn't ready. We did give a bunch of his most beautiful, newest clothes to the Katrina effort, but his humble work clothes remain in the closet to this day! I find his gardening shoes and his glasses to be the most difficult thing to think about letting go. Somehow, to me they are the most personal items of clothing. I will break down big-time when it comes time to do that. Mama will be 88 in July, so I've decided that after she passes, I'll just do both of their closets at the same time--and I hope it will be some years yet befor I have to do that! Anyway, Jackie, my heart goes out to you today and each day of your journey. Please be good to yourself--you deserve it. Margaret
  5. Dear Wilma-- Oh, honey! I am so sorry for all you've been through. I teared up when I read your story--you must NOT be one bit guilty for what you did. You did a very loving thing for your mama. Her yelling and fussing about your so-called treachery---you said yourself that this was very unusual behavior for her. I know I'm not supposed to diagnose on this board, but I'm sure going to let you know what I think happened. From her symptoms, I believe the cancer had spread to her brain. The brain is the number one metastasis for both breast and lung cancer. She could have had the seeds of brain metastasis for months but was asymptomatic until very late in the game when the tumor/tumors grew enough to cause neurological symptoms. This was a real mercy, to have it happen right at the end. Sometimes it takes months to die with brain cancer, and it's really bad to go through. It was good that it happened to her the way it did. The other thing that might have caused her change of personality was lack of oxygen to the brain, which could have been caused by many things--but especially the fact that she had lung cancer. I have been an RN for thirty years this month, and have cared for many with lung cancer, including my darling father in-law. He had lung cancer for three years before it spread to his brain--my husband and I were watching for neuro symptoms like a hawk. Three days before he passed, his speech got slurred and his right eye was swollen--and the eye was no longer tracking. We knew instantly what was going on, and told Hospice to get ready (they'd been with us for six months already). They brought in a hospital bed and all the rest of the medical equipment that very day. He went into a coma over a two-day period and fought every step of the way, sometimes physically--and the third day he relaxed, and then he was able to die. Finally. My sweet Charles. This is a tender time for you, Wilma, with Mother's Day tomorrow. Please do not let this load of toxic guilt poison and weaken you. Think what your mama would say to you from heaven--how sad she would be that she inadvertently caused that pain you feel. Surely you know she would not have said those things had she not been disoriented. And she would want you to think of the good things as much as possible as you heal from this terrible trauma. You will still have great pain and a long time healing from losing your mother, but please try to give yourself a gift tomorrow--shedding that guilt. You have absolutely nothing to reproach yourself for. Write back to us any time. You are among friends. Margaret
  6. Oh, and P.S. Mikey--- Sneak another one into your lives as soon as you are ready. Don't worry about the wife! She'll love it. Get either a wee little tyke or a big, affectionate, squashy lap sitter that needs a home. I have noticed in the lives of my pets that the younger they are, the more infantile they remain. I don't recommend getting one younger than 7 weeks, but we had that happen twice with two dying five-week old babies, just three months apart---and one was my Penny, who was so infantile that he would nurse on my ear every night, including the night before he died. The other, Fanchon H'sa, was a gorgeous little lynx-point Siamese female who grew, prospered, and lived 17 happy years with us. She was so small and sick that we kept her in a genuine sheepskin rug turned over on itself shaggy-sides in like a taco, and we shoved her in there. She lived there for three solid weeks until she was strong enough to come out. The way we knew she was still alive was that the food would be gone and there were little litter tracks leading from her cat box back to the sheepskin. She nursed on that sheepskin rug until the day she died. Kind of gross, but you can machine wash sheepskins and tumble dry them! Anyway, you get the point. Infantile cats are my specialest, most favoritest, bestest puddies.
  7. Hi again, Mikey-- Thank you for writing back. It sounds as if you are on the road to healing in very healthy ways. While no pet can be a substitute for another, they can still be so very comforting in and of themselves. We have eight cats and two dogs. I am thinking of buying stock in the company that sells the sticky clothes-roller thing that gets rid of the cat hair. It sounds as if your lap was full with Pumpkin and Muggsy, too! Ours certainly are. I hope you can get a fine new lap-sitter soon. As far as the number 13, I love it in spite of Penny living all those thirteens. I was born on a Friday 13th of May, and our newest kitten, Chance (found at a bank drive-through!), entered our lives on Friday, July 13th, 2007. Baby Penrod died with all those thirteens, but he was sick, and so that became his lucky day. As sad as I was and am at being cheated of a proper cat lifetime spent with him, I am--and always will be--at peace with that day. Again, thank you for writing and extending a welcome to me. Please write some more so I can read it again soon. You are very, very talented. Maybe you could write something funny, say, about your babies and I'll promise to write back with my experiences. Or anything else you'd like to write about, for that matter. If anyone else would like to do that, why, that would be fine. It helps to get to know people even better to read about what is important to them. Take care, and perhaps we will be writing more very soon! Margaret
  8. Hi, Kathy-- I am so very sorry about your loss. It is so draining, this grief. I am so happy that you have a caring company to work with you so you can do work at home. I agree, the pros outweigh the cons. However, I have a question for you: how much are you getting out of the house in a 24-hour period? You see, you hit the nail on the head about getting away from the house to work--it is its own healing to get away from all the thousands of reminders of you and Bill and your life together. Being with your furbaby is not enough reason to stay home if it stunts your healing time by holing up in the house too much. Please know that I am not sitting in judgment of you in any way. I admire your guts to be able to work and live in a situation that is intolerable at times. We must find our way ourselves, our decisions our own. My advice to you? Do go back to work at your workplace when you can. Until then, you must get out of the house a minimum of 2-3 times daily to shop, take a walk, etc. And use "good work hygiene" in your work area. I'd remove most, if not all, of the physical triggers of your grief. Keep the pup in your lap, though! God bless you and may your healing be successful. I care.
  9. Hi, Mikey--- I am late to the "party" (huh! some party), but I want to tell you how sorry I am that you lost Pumpkin. I lost a kitten to feline leuk, too. Penrod was 13 months and 13 days old, and he died on the 13th of June, 1989. My pain today when I think of him is every bit as fresh as the day I lost him. It's maddening when a person gives you that fakey kind of smile and says, "I know just how you feel.". They don't. But maybe, just maybe, I do. And you understand me, too. It's so painful to love like we do. I am new here, just joined today. I am here due to a far greater grief even than losing Penny. It's so bad that I can't even talk about it yet. Those idiots at Reader's Digest don't have a clue about what constitutes good writing. Your article was incredibly touching, celebrating the lives of your pets, yet being in intractable pain due to their passing. You are a fine writer. Please write some more. A lot more! Again, I am so sorry that you lost your baby. There's a special circle of hell for that demonic virus. Be good to yourself and take your time healing. You--and your welfare, feelings, and journey in grief--are important here.
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